"That's the only reason you think he was murdered? The way the suicide note was written?"
"No. But the note's part of it. It tells me Rafe didn't write the note. And it tells me quite a bit about who did. Whoever wrote the note didnt know Rafe very well, but they knew him—and probably on a business or professional level. Why else would he have played the redneck role other than to use it to some kind of advantage? In their conversation or conversations, Rafe wanted the person to think he was dumb. And they believed the act enough to try and mimic him on paper. So that leaves us with some reasonable suppositions: The person who wrote the note was involved with Rafe in some kind of business dealing. He was probably an American originally from the north, probably articulate, probably egotistical—all necessary for Rafe to make his redneck routine work."
Jessica was looking at him. "My God," she said. "The logical mind."
Ford was warming to the subject, arranging it in his mind as he talked. "Whoever wrote the note was the murderer or one of the murderers. That's the working hypothesis. Match it with some of the other things I saw on the island, and you come up with an even clearer picture. It was probably two men. They didn't known much about boats or knots, so they had to come in a very small boat—the kind that doesn't carry more than two people. The water's so shallow, they wouldn't have made it to the island otherwise. They beached at the same cove Rafe beached his boat; they weren't comfortable in the woods, and stuck around for a while after Rafe was dead, probably looking for something. The emeralds, maybe, but that's an assumption. They didn't find what they were looking for Thursday, the day they killed him, so they came back yesterday for another look. A big golden-silk spider had a web across the path from the cove, and someone had walked through it. Rafe was tall enough to hit it, but he wouldn't have—he grew up in the woods. The man who walked through the web was coming from or going to his boat; probably going, because he was preoccupied, wasn't watching. It only takes a golden-silk spider about three hours to completely rebuild its web, and the spider was a little more than half done when I got there.
"Another thing: Rafe thought he had no reason to fear the killer or killers. If they arrived before he did, he would have seen their boat in the cove. If they came afterward, he would have seen them coming across the bay. So they were probably there on a business deal. He wasn't taking social calls. And they were probably buying, not selling.''
"Sherlock Holmes," she said. "You're almost scary, Ford. You know the color of the man's eyes? What he had for breakfast?" She was half serious. "You think they were there to buy the emeralds."
Ford said, "If they were, it knocks down an earlier assumption: that Rafe had taken the emeralds from the men who ultimately kidnapped his son. He wouldn't sell something he thought he needed to trade for his son. But it doesn't matter what they were there to buy and it doesn't matter what else I know. The death certificate says death by hanging. Even if the coroner took the time to find out what really killed Rafe—and I doubt if he did—the autopsy report will support the death certificate. The body has been cremated, so the killer is in the clear. If there's no body, there's no way to refute the autopsy."
"But couldn't the police test the ashes some way? You hear all about those police labs; they can tell everything from a little piece of carpet fiber, tiny things like that."
"After cremation—man or animal—the only thing you can test for in the lab is metal content in the bones. The metallic poisons, like arsenic, aren't destroyed by fire. I doubt if Rafe was poisoned, but, if he was, they wouldn't have used arsenic. Arsenic tastes bad. It has to be given in small doses over a long period of time."
"You're an expert of poisons, too?"
"No, but seventy-five percent of the aquarium fish bought and sold in the U.S. are originally stunned and caught through the use of poisons. All over the world they're killing the reefs by dumping cyanide just so collectors in this country can fill their tanks with pretty tropicals. It's come up in my work before; I know a little."
"So there really is nothing you can do—about your friend, I mean."
"I could get some kind of investigation going into the odd procedures of Everglades County, but it wouldn't clear Rafe. Plus it would just take away from the time I need to find a way to free Rafe's son. When I ran into him that time in Costa Rica, Rafe was looking for work. I gave him the names of some people. I thought they might help him. So, directly or indirectly, I played a part. I helped get him involved with the people who kidnapped his son."
Jessica said, "You can't blame yourself for that, Doc."
Ford looked at her for a moment. "Why would I blame myself? I meant that I'm one of the early links in a long chain; the one best suited to trace the events that followed. I've already contacted a guy I know in Masagua. He's on the National Security Affair's field staff—they're the ones who recommend what the CIA should or should not be doing. It's this guy's job to cultivate contacts, make surveys, assemble data; like a combination librarian and investigative reporter. The NSA sets up their people with cover jobs—they have him publishing a small
English-language newspaper—and he pokes around the country, filing reports. He's looking for Jake right now. If the NSA guy can get him, I'll sell the emeralds and set up some kind of trust fund for the boy . . . maybe make sure he doesn't go back to his drunken mother."
"They're that valuable?"
"There are two; each about the size of a bird's egg. "
She stiffened a little, showing her concern. "Tell me you're not keeping them at your place, Ford. You're too smart to keep something so dangerous."
"No one knows I have the emeralds. Besides, I put them in a place no one would ever look—down the mouths of some preserved sharks. In my lab." Ford took a drink of wine. All that talking, and he wanted a beer. He got up and went to the refrigerator.
As he came back, Jessica was saying it was so damn sad such bad things could happen to people; really feeling it, her head on Ford's shoulder, and he could smell the shampoo scent of her hair. The poor little boy out there all alone. His father dead and a mother that probably didn't care—her arms around Ford now, holding him. Then she was kissing his neck, squeezing him, touching her lips to his cheeks, and it was becoming something else, no longer grief. Ford pulled away. "Whoa, what's going on here, lady?"
Jessica looked up, eyes moist but smiling. "Sometimes you're such a bastard for details; getting everything straight."
"I thought we had an agreement."
She said, "Our experiment. That's why I called you." Her fingers were on his thigh, then his abdomen, touching softly, drawing designs. "I want it to end tonight." Like a little girl, not looking at him.
Ford let her fall against his chest, slid his hands along her ribs brushing the firm weight of her breasts . . . thought of the painting, and almost said something silly to lighten the mood.
He did not.
* * *
There would be no need for CBS, Ford was thinking, not if every woman in the world looked just like this.